Guest post by Lorraine Yapps Cohen
California Air Resources Board (CARB) met on Thursday, May 24. On the agenda was discussion toward deciding where and how to spend the billions raised from cap-and-trade carbon trading in the state.
At the public meeting was Betty Plowman, who attended the meeting to present a letter on behalf of the industries that CARB calls polluters, the California Construction Trucking Association (CCTA) and California Dump Truck Owners Association. The letter describes CARB’s threats to these industries, induced by the Board’s regulations that are, in turn, based on junk science. The letter’s signatories indicate intention to seek reparations for the regulated class under CARB’s repression in California.
CARB Chairman Mary Nichols let the clock conduct the agenda and closed the meeting at 5 p.m. before Plowman could present the letter. The world according to CARB disallows any voicing of concerns.
“It was just another day in paradise, wasn’t it?” said Plowman in her personal communications on the meeting. “I thought of ‘The Price is Right’ announcer saying ‘come on down.’ Everyone get their hands out; decide where this windfall should go.”
CARB disallowed the presentation of public concerns. Mary Nichols, in her authoritative overreach, simply adjourned the meeting when dissenting perspective tried to be heard, as seen in this video:
Despite that the letter received no air time at the CARB meeting, the matter is not likely to go away. The tyranny of Mary Nichols and CARB wears thin on the regulated. Their letter seeking reparations follows.
RE: Reparations to the Regulatory Class in California
Dear Governor Brown | Mary Nichols:
Recently, Robert Jenne, Assistant Counsel to the California Air Resources Board (CARB) released a written statement that we in the specific industries that CARB recognizes as polluters are hereby branded as the “Regulated Class” in California and subject to the rule and regulation of the agency and are bound to accept their rule at any cost. The class includes those who live and work productively in the transportation, manufacturing, construction and agriculture/forestry sectors of the California economy.
In this letter we inform you of the first action we are taking to meet this threat to our livelihood and our freedom, enacted by unelected bureaucrats without the due process guaranteed to us by the Constitution.
We the undersigned reject the classification by CARB. In the state of California we represent a minority of the population and have been singled out by regulators simply because we produce the goods and services required to build and maintain a modern society. We request Governor Jerry Brown, Chairman Mary Nichols and the State of California make payment as reparations, to those individuals and commercial entities who have been severely damaged by laws and regulations. These laws and regulations are based on junk science, sometimes conducted by individuals without valid credentials, contrived to achieve the control now shown to be the objective behind the charade.
Certain California state employees, board members, members of certain scientific review panels, and members of the California legislature and bureaucracy pushed these laws through the Legislature and its agencies without concern for the well being of its citizens, the public health, and the economic well being of the regulated class. Under the guise of a moral crusade to protect the environment, these agents of California government have generated an accumulating residue of economic damage, unintended consequences, bureaucracy and repression. Indeed agents of California government have learned to manufacture hypothetical threats in order to cement and expand state power and to enable the collection of funds needed to sustain and expand its grip.
California is unique in its extremism and excesses in the ruthless pursuit of societal control. The collapse of the Western Climate Initiative gives evidence that California stands alone in North Americain its activism and agenda. In the same way that the 19th century Confederacy rationalized and defended keeping a large segment of its productive population under extreme exploitive control, today the state government of California takes for granted its ability to control the backbone of its productive population. As Americans we are reclaiming our unalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Hundreds of thousands of California citizens and businesses have been displaced and/or lost their jobs, careers and homes over agendas borne by radical agents in the California legislature, executive offices, and its supporting cast of NGOs and academics. We as citizens of California can no longer bear the brunt of this attack on our freedoms and exercise our right to protect ourselves from these excessive regulations designed to end our livelihoods and our well being.
The losses borne by this “Regulated Class” are immense. Details will be provided to you in the form of actual losses from regulations borne by the California Air Resource Board that have no benefit to Man or the environment. We will base our demand for reparations on this accounting.
Signatories,
==============================================================
The reality is that the state will find a way to grab the money to support its continuing out of control spending, now in the red to the tune of over 16 billion dollars. In effect, this just becomes a backdoor tax scheme. See http://www.calwatchdog.com/2012/01/11/brown-wants-cap-trade-for-pensions/
The letter’s signatories indicate the intention to seek reparations for damages to the “regulated class” as defined by CARB. In so doing the class placed itself as a new example of minority exploitation by a repressive state government.
Related articles
- Can market for clean-air credits resist profiteers? (sacbee.com)
- Areas of Concern Remain for Regulated Industries with Regard to Carb’s Cap-and-Trade Regulation (prweb.com)
- California counting its carbon tax riches (junkscience.com)
- The Many Moving Pieces of California’s Cap and Trade Program (junkscience.com)
- Cap and Trade protest petition in California (wattsupwiththat.com)
- Quebec to Join California’s Cap-and-Trade Program (sustainablebusiness.com)
Hey, remember when Schwarzenegger said he was going to get rid of CARB? Good times, good times.
I’ve had a couple of run-ins with that agency, my experience was they had less concern with air quality and more with maintaining and expanding their bureaucratic domain and sense of control over others (and of course budget).
There’s just nothing like a leftist bully.
Friends:
I am not an American and I am writing to ask a question that derives from genuine ignorance of the procedures of American government(s).
The video shows Ms Nichols said the meeting was “not a Hearing”. And, from her stated reasons for being “disappointed”, it is clear she was not receptive to disagreement with the proposals that were the subject of the meeting.
So, can somebody tell a disinterested onlooker (i.e. me) if the legislative process includes another public meeting to be held at a later date which will accept petitions from members of the public?
Richard
Fascism comes wearing a smiley face and sandals.
I had to replay that twice to be sure. In the opening shot, it shows the board.
THERE WERE JUST TWO PEOPLE AT THE BOARD TABLE.
Their listing shows 11 members. Did a quorum ever exist for this “meeting”?
That alone would make any decisions made by the board moot.
Trying to find the minutes for this meeting…
California is billions of dollars in debt and they’re having hearings on what to do with a new revenue source…
No wonder they’re headed towards bankruptcy
Were they following the correct “parliamentary procedure” ? It would have to be presented under “New Business” and it might require a sponsor before it could be presented.
If you do not know the rules under which the meeting operates you are going to be SOL
This observation is from my husband who covers town meetings as a newspaper “stringer” and his familiarity with The Ballad of Robert’s Rules by George Flynn. (NESFA hymnal Vol 2.) unfortunately not available on line. http://www.nesfa.org/press/Books/NESFAHymnalv2e1.htm
Maybe it is time for a youtube (at least he can carry a tune)
I have always asked, “Why does CARB even exist?” Talk about a redundant waste of taxpayer money – and that’s without even considering their tyrannical behavior.
I’m still puzzled how California plans to get C&T past the courts since it is either a new tax that hasn’t been voted on with the proper majority or a government mandated purchase which is unconstitutional. I guess that’s where magical thinking comes in once again.
Jesus!!!
Richard Courtney: I’d say, as a guess, that based on past experience that any new meeting will most definately NOT allow the petition concerns to be addressed. CARB has two functions: 1) to increase tax revenue to the state and 2) regulate “dirty” businesses out of it. Once they get rid of all that nasty capitalism the fairy farts can fund the state’s social agenda.
Kalifornia.Taking up where Lenin and Stalin left off.
Hire a few more public servants and establish a few more tribunals, enquiries and authorities. Only way to go.
Rhoda R:
Thankyou for your answer to my question. Unless someone provides a more definitive answer I will take your “guess” as being correct.
I suppose it must all be part of the existence of a written Constitution; i.e. nobody gets what is not written. Perhaps you will recognise that such things are not easy to understand when – being British as I am – one has always been the subject of a constitutional monarchy.
Anyway, I watch with interest. Again, thankyou.
Richard
It was previously said if California was split off from the US it would be the sixth largest economy in the world. Has the EU gotten so messed up that this is still true?
It’s like two guys stopped on a highway arguing in the middle of the night, one driving a Prius, the other a Peugeot. A semi comes by, smashes them both, keeps on going. Afterwards both are on the ground with two broken legs each.
California speaks up, “Ha, I won!”
EU says “What do you mean? We are both seriously hurt, neither of us are walking away from this.”
California says “Yeah, but I got a longer torso so I can sit up taller than you. Plus I’m much more handsome. Winning!!“
Simple… MOVE. Let the inbred bureaucrats haul their own crap.
WHO IS JOHN GALT?
Public consultation? At which all opposing views were shut out?
It’s a sham and a disgrace.
And don’t you just love the way the charming Mary Nichols laughs as she thanks the dissenters for their (unheard) input and slams the door in their faces. What a basty nitch!
Merovign says:
“Hey, remember when Schwarzenegger said he was going to get rid of CARB? Good times, good times.”
I remember… It wasn’t all that long before that shiftless liar decided instead to eliminate the previously-existing 30-year rolling smog-test exemption for passenger cars (once the car passed 30 years of age, it no longer required biennial testing) and instead freeze the date at the 1975 model year. If your car is 1976 or newer in California and you’re in the counties covered by biennial smog test requirements (aka, ‘actual population centers’), your car is now and forever be required to pass the smog test… and they keep tightening the ‘pass’ standards on the tests, too – – it now in many cases requires these cars to meet higher standards than were required when they were new. Regardless of many smog-specific components not having been manufactured for 20+ years.
I have a trophy-winning 1980 show car that gets driven less than 1000 miles a year; I’ve spent countless hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars keeping it ‘smog legal.’ It’s actual ‘pollution’ impact is effectively zero, using less than 50 gallons of gas a year. My housecats likely emit more greenhouse gasses in a year than that car does.
CARB at one time did necessary and useful duty cleaning up the air in CA’s biggest cities, but it has (as all unlimited bureaucracies will) metastasized into a bloated, amorphous monster that knows no practical bounds and now exists for no other reasons than to expand its power and reward its minions.
Much like the state government, but without generating even the ill-advised handouts the elected buffoons have to keep tossing out to stay in their jobs. Bureaucracies like the CARB are all ‘take.’
CARB isn’t all bad, and has had some reasonable successes over the decades that have resulted in measurably better air quality – think catalytic converters, PCV systems, fuel vapor recovery systems, and other devices which resulted in a tangible increase in air quality in places like the LA basin. But CARB as it exists in 2012, pushing ever more expensive solutions for ever decreasing returns, is clearly off the rails.
So far the only court case I can remember taking place was in the UK, where Al Gore’s film ” An Inconvenient Truth” was adjudged to contain lies. I have been waiting for various other cases to come to court but it seems to be a long time coming. I can see a queue of cases forming and one day the flood gates will open and the courts will be full of (global warming) climate change litigation only then will the truth be laid bare.
Cal EPA (yes, the state has their own EPA because the federal version isn’t draconian enough) listens to CARB. This has historically eliminated Diesel cars from California. Plus there are 7 other states that automatically follow California’s auto requirements. The result is that few manufacturers sell Diesels in the USA. Since Diesel cars get about 20% better mileage than spark ignition cars, and about half the cars sold in Europe are Diesels, CARB is solely responsible for about a 10% increase in automobile fuel consumption in the USA.
Reference: http://www.edmunds.com/ Volkswagen and Mercedes both sell spark ignition and Diesel engines in the same car model (Jetta and E-class). In both cases, the Diesels win by 20% or more in the same car.
And in the department of redundancy department, California also has the South Coast Air Quality Management District, just in case EPA, Cal EPA, and CARB may have missed something.
The C.A.R.B. is quickly placing the state in a position where it is at war with its population. Recent decisions are going to cause electricity rates to skyrocket. People are going to want to use wood for heating and cooking at the rate things are going but if it is not a “burn day”, you can be fined or even jailed for burning wood. The CARB must go. At least cut its budget by 85%. None of the 56 other states have an ARB, why does California even need one?
The board was in full attendance just prior to the negative comments that started to show up, including Senator Fran Pavley, the author of AB32 and Cap N Trade legislation. Once the negative comments started to come in, one by one, the board members left, leaving only Mary Nichols and her staff member remaining. The public has no say in California, neither do the lawmakers want to hear from the public. It is afterall a one party system more liberal than any socialist country.
and who is going to be stuck paying the reparations?
ha ha ha.
so the regulated class will be demanding part of the loot.
that will surely solve the problem of looting, eh?
freakin nutz
richardscourtney says:
May 31, 2012 at 12:43 pm
Richard,
I do not know what the actual legal standing this meeting was held under. However, as a frequent participant in these types of meetings I can tell you that it doesn’t matter. If you disagree with the agenda of those elected officials, they will smile, thank you for your input and simply go do what ever they please. Also as sure as death and taxes, these meetings usually take place in the afternoon when most people are actually working and cannot attend.
If you read “Ecotopia” and “Ecotopia Emerging” the portrait which emerges of the Ecotopian leader is one that obviously took a page from Allende. Callenbach clearly modeled his utopia after short lived Allende era Chile. Is it any surprise that we now have people who are just like that running the “Eco-bureaucracy?”
and australia is going down the same drain we start our carbon tax $23 a ton 7/1/2012 ? to Nichols and Gillard why do you hate us so much
In the end, when all is said, there is nothing like a well placed offer politicians can’t refuse.
Someone forgot to put a Finger in the Dike of Bureaucracy- might have gotten a friendlier hearing.
To; Richard Courtney
The meeting was pro forma — a regulatory requirement that the state get “input” on what to do with its windfall of funds that will be coming its way under Cap-and_Trade. So all manner of characters showed up with ideas for spending and with hands out for a piece of the action. In reality the State will use it to help close its well known shortfall in government worker pension funds http://www.calwatchdog.com/2012/01/11/brown-wants-cap-trade-for-pensions/ and for various boondoggles http://capoliticalnews.com/2012/05/18/will-cap-and-trade-cure-california%E2%80%99s-deficit-100-billion-in-ten-years-for-govt/ That is, it is the backdoor tax to allow California to continue its descent to Greek or Spanish status.
With this in mind, Chairman Nichols was ill prepared and did not take kindly to the floor challenge to the very premise of the whole business: A shake down of the wealth-generating sector of the economy, under the guise of saving the planet. Everyone knows that climate has nothing to do with it, but in the one-party state of California, too few can or do pay attention to what is really going on.
As for a written Constitution, it helps to have one, but you have to sign on to adhering to it. Her Majesty’s government does not have a written one, but it has not done badly, by and large.
These dirty old capitalist regulated class MUST purchase carbon offsets from the government.
I wonder who sells them to the gov’t. Horses & buggies and electric car owners, Maybe. Or is this a subsidy for solar/wind money losers.
Dan in California said:
May 31, 2012 at 2:00 pm
Cal EPA (yes, the state has their own EPA because the federal version isn’t draconian enough)
———————————–
Why hasn’t obama launched a lawsuit against California like he did against Arizona when, in its struggle against illegal-alienism, it attempted to abet Fed authority?
Eric “Fast & Furious” Holder said: “”Setting immigration policy and enforcing immigration laws is a national responsibility…”
But California has its own EPA, setting environmental policy and enforcing – are they not usurping Federal powers like Arizona tried to do?
I guess it suits obama to have a state-based shadow of his Fed politburo so he can govern by fiat through his barackracy.
I wannna get outa California before the green-curtain becomes as inescapably strong as the iron one was.
This meeting was to discuss disposition of the C&T funds already mandated by CA law – not to discuss the merits of C&T. The letter and dissenting comments were misplaced.
The CA legislature is the only place where this madness can be stopped.
Reblogged this on Is it 2012 in Nevada County Yet?.
If California weren’t so far left, it could take Greece’s place in the Euro Zone.
A true Commissar. What is it about the modern US “Democrats” that so like playing Czars and Commissars. Hmmm… could be the name of a political board-game, a kind of inverse Monopoly.
for all of you in California, all I can say is…
Come to Texas!!! Texas is open for business, and we want you!
You want to feel appreciated for creating jobs rather than punished?
COME TO TEXAS!!!
(Please!!!)
Fat malignant spider
I’ve lived in this state for far too long…
This was released today. The weird part of all this, the general public doesn’t support cap-and-trade and 2/3rds feel California is on the wrong track.
NEW: Cap & Trade parasite bill signals civil war on business
May 31, 2012
source: http://www.calwatchdog.com/2012/05/31/cap-trade-parasite-bill-signals-civil-war-on-business/
By Wayne Lusvardi
Speaker John A. Perez’s push of Assembly Bill 1532 through the State Assembly on Tuesday, May 29, signals a shift from regulation of air pollution to an outright civil war on business and industry in California.
AB 1532 is not content with just using pollution taxes collected under California’s Cap and Trade emissions trading program to lower water, power, and natural gas bills for ratepayers, due to the looming higher price of green power. Rather, AB 1532 will directly use Cap and Trade taxes to parasitically transfer jobs taken from the private sector, to political pork jobs in the public sector. It could also end up circumventing the limitation of new taxes of Propositions 13 and 26. The passage of AB 1532 is a provocative act that crosses the line between regulation and outright plunder of the private sector for public sector make work green jobs programs.
Link to the AB 32 Poll results:
http://www.calwatchdog.com/2012/05/03/the-speculative-game-with-cap-and-trade/
The poll, authored by the AB 32 Implementation Group, submitted the polling information to the CARB, but it appears that CARB has turned a deaf ear on Californians.
Several decades ago I participated in a CARB hearing on dealing with airborne asbestos in California. Early in the meeting a presenter described a relatively short gravel road in California made from asbestos containing rocks. He suggested that this road alone was responsible for 30 percent of the airborne asbestos in the state.
Later, several of us from the auto industry discussed asbestos brake linings. There was significant debate whether or not asbestos in brakes were responsible for 0.01 percent of the asbestos exposure in the state, or 0.0001 percent. Debate centered on a presentation showing data that 99 percent of the asbestos in brake linings is transformed into Forsterite (dirt) during braking. CARB, of course, declared that ALL of the asbestos in linings ended up in California air, even that in junk yards.
I made a suggestion that we turn our attention to finding a method of paving the asbestos roadway rather than arguing about how much of brake linings turn into Forsterite. A CARB member curtly shut off all further discussion with the curt reply: “We don’t regulate roads. We regulate YOU because we already have a process in place for regulating you.”
Okay guys; you gotta go read up on this – California established ‘CARB’ (or its predecessor) BEFORE the passage of the Clean Air Act (which in 1970 addressed/established requirements for air pollution controls):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Air_Resources_Board
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Clean_Air_Act
.
Wow. This is similar to what happened in Australia with our legislation for CO2 tax and Emissions Trading Scheme (i.e. Cap and Trader). The Government called for submissions to a Join Parliamentary Committee on “Australia Clean Energy Future Legislation” Over 4500 submissions were received. The Committee, under control of the Government and the Greens, decided only 70 submissions were acceptable. The others were classified as correspondence, not submissions, and were not published. Some of the 70 that were accepted were dated and received after the closing date. http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/House_of_Representatives_Committees?url=jscacefl/subs.htm
What a fiasco. That’s how democracy works under the current “down under” government.
Tom Johnson says:
May 31, 2012 at 6:21 pm
“We don’t regulate roads. We regulate YOU because we already have a process in place for regulating you.”
=========
My wife and I moved out here a couple of years ago from the East Coast. We’re convinced there has to be something to explain the attitude in California but haven’t discovered it yet. Maybe its a missing gene.
I estimate the costs for the Australian CO2 tax and Cap and Trade legislation at nine times the benefits, and that is if the assumptions of an optimal system are implemented by the world, in unison, starting July 1, 2012! Explanation below.
Benefit to cost ratio of the Australian CO2 pricing scheme to 2050
In an interesting exchange between Roger W. Cohen, William Happer and Richard Lindzen, and reply by William D. Nordhaus on “The New York Review of Books” here Professor William Nordhaus (hereafter WN) said:
”
Particularly note this bit:
I am surprised that WN says the $3.5 trillion is a significant number, given that it is cumulative to 2050 and is for the whole world. I am also surprised that WN says skeptics “should not object to spending much smaller sums for slowing climate change starting now.” I consider the Australian situation and calculate the costs to achieve the Australian share of the $3.5 trillion reduction in climate damages would be around nine times greater than Australia’s share of the estimated $3.5 trillion saving. Here is how I did my calculations.
I converted the estimated $3.5 trillion world damages avoided to the Australian proportion on the basis of Australia’s share of world GDP, i.e. 1.17%. So Australia’s share of damages avoided is 1.17% x $3.5 trillion = $41 billion. That is the cumulative damages avoided by Australia to 2050. It assumes an optimal CO2 price, the whole world implements the CO2 price in unison, and an economically efficient system is implemented across the whole world. It also assumes Australia’s share of world GDP remains constant.
The Australian Treasury estimated the loss of GDP that our legislated CO2 tax and ETS will cause. [ However, it seems they may have underestimated because they, apparently, have not estimated the compliance cost]. The cumulative loss of GDP to 2050 is $1,345 billion (undiscounted) (Chart 5:13), or $390 billion discounted at 4.34%, which I believe is the discount rate that is the default in RICE (2012) and gives the value of $3.5 trillion quoted by WN.
If my calculations are correct, the benefit, to Australia, of the optimum CO2 tax rate (if the world implements an economically efficient CO2 pricing scheme in unison) would be $41 billion and the cost (reduced GDP) would be $390 billion. Therefore, the benefit to cost ratio is 0.11. [benefit/cost should be greater than 1 for the policy to be justified] .
Therefore, I do not understand WN’s statement that “[sceptics] should not object to spending much smaller sums for slowing climate change starting now.” My calculations suggest we would spend nine times greater sums, not smaller sums, to achieve the benefits estimated by WN.
There is a remedy avaialble. It’s time for a ‘Hokey Pokey Election’ in Greater California!
“You put the right ones in. You take the left ones out…..That’s what it’s all about!”
_Jim says:
May 31, 2012 at 6:28 pm
“Okay guys; you gotta go read up on this –….”
============
To what end.
The weak minded, want the short story.
wws says:
May 31, 2012 at 5:23 pm
for all of you in California, all I can say is…
Come to Texas!!! Texas is open for business, and we want you!
You want to feel appreciated for creating jobs rather than punished?
COME TO TEXAS!!!
(Please!!!)
—
And in doing so, they will also bring their ELECTORAL VOTES to Texas… [hee, hee]
Mods, a re-do por favor due to a formatting muff …
If you had been sharp in your first cursory read, you would have noticed that I included the vital Cliff’s Notes ‘takeaway’/sound bite version … right? (Who, what, where/location and when/dates/times, relevant jurisdictional authority etc … right?) and taking note of those ‘vitals’ their argument and ensuing discussion re: Cal EPA vs Fed EPA jurisdiction (here is a quiz for you) is:
a) sublime or
b) moot?
.
Peter Lang says:
May 31, 2012 at 6:45 pm
Nordhaus slipped the argument from the likelihood of any climate damage at all to … is X trillion dollars signficant. As usual with the advocates, you have to keep your eye on the pea. Cohen, Lindzen and Happer simply pointed out that it is silly to quote computed benefits to three signficant figures when we don’t know the climate sensitivity to even one signficant figure. And it is very likely that the sensitivity is much smaller than assumed by WN.
Econs like Nordhaus either don’t understand the simplest concepts of uncertainty or they are simply disingenuous.
It’s important to note that C&T revenues will be used to fund new programs, and will do nothing to reduce the current $16 billion deficit. Complete fiscal idiocy. It’s also worth noting that the C&T tax (and that’s what it is – a tax) is in addition to the massive tax hikes sought by Gov. Brown which will be on the ballot in November. The people of California are gonna get crushed.
Roger Cohen,
Yes. Thank you for pointing that out.
I do find Nordhaus’s DICE and RICE modelling valuable for several reasons:
1. it shows very clearly that policies like Kyoto, and policies proposed by Sir Nicholas Stern, Al Gore and some of the limits being advocated for CO2 emissions, CO2 concentrations, or temperatures, would be hugely expensive and impracticable
2. it shows that there is no urgency to get started (i.e. delaying 50 years will have little effect on the climate)
3. it shows that it is pointless to act unless the whole world acts together with an economically efficient system (which is virtually impossible)
4. it shows what are the most important parameters (e.g. the damage function) href=”http://nordhaus.econ.yale.edu/Balance_2nd_proofs.pdf”>(2008) A Question of Balance, Table 7-2, p130.
5. it documents how enormous are the uncertainties on the most important parameters
6. it shows where we would need to place our research effort to reduce the uncertainties (e.g. the damage function and climate sensitivity)
7. it focuses attention on just how uncertain and probably exaggerated to the high side are the damage estimates and the damage function
8. it provides a way to demonstrate all the above to the pragmatic ‘luke warmists’, those with an open mind, politicians and media.
u.k.(us) said:
May 31, 2012 at 7:03 pm
_Jim says:
May 31, 2012 at 6:28 pm
“Okay guys; you gotta go read up on this –….”
============
To what end.
The weak minded, want the short story.
—————————————————————-
Hey u.k.(us): I don’t come to this blog because I want “the short story”, I can get that in the MSM.
As to being weak minded, it is true that I am not a scientist, but I come here and I read, and I do my best to understand. I am sure that there is a lot of stuff I don’t know, but I don’t see how that makes me weak minded.
There’s something unsettling about that “I detest you” smile that creeps across a bureaucrat’s face when the public starts talking back.
GeoLurking says:
May 31, 2012 at 1:31 pm
Simple… MOVE. Let the inbred bureaucrats haul their own crap.
———————————-
That’s the idea. They get rid of all but ‘your’ company and you get all the business. You can certainly afford a little ‘giving back’ to your favorite rep. A little grease keeps the wheels turning. Unions love this.
They meet to get ideas as to what to do with all the ‘projected revenue gains’. As the saying goes ‘Follow the money’. My guess is no one will suggest ‘pay state debt’ as an option.
All your base are belong to us.
Peter Lang says:
May 31, 2012 at 9:17
Your comment and observations are spot on.
I agree that Nordhaus’s model is a useful instructional tool. And it tells us a lot that his optimum carbon tax needs to be gradually implemented over decades in order to minimize its economic cost, while saving longer term environmental damage (all assuming the IPCC is right). So much for the advantages of the “green economy.”
If you research the damage function, you will find that the values are set by the method of “subjective probability.” While it is a technique often used in social psychology when you don’t know the answer, it is far from rigorous, being subject to the inputters prejudices. As a result the numbers from different inputters (take Tol and Mendelsohn as opposite extremes) are all over the place. Nordhaus takes several inputs and forms a “consensus.” It is this consensus that tells us that his optimum carbon tax, based on a climate sensitivity of 3.0 deg C for 2 x CO2, will save us X trillion dollars (as you see, X is a function of time). These savings arise by lowering the global average temperature 0.1 deg C over a century or more. We are then asked to enact such a tax to “save” 0.1 deg, an absurdity on the face of it.
“Keep your eye on the pea,” as you have done.
The presentation of public concerns only happens in a democracy.
However, this happened in California; if you lived here, you’d understand.
D Caldwell says:
This meeting was to discuss disposition of the C&T funds already mandated by CA law – not to discuss the merits of C&T. The letter and dissenting comments were misplaced. The CA legislature is the only place where this madness can be stopped.
D Caldwell, what better place to spend this windfall than on those who they are stealing this money from. They want the Cap N Trade, they can have it if they pay the people whom have to be financially hurt by it. Why use the money to balance the state budget or pay for pensions? In doing so there is no benefit. Paying the people who supposedly are the polluters gives a benefit as the liberals can have their regulation without hurting people and business. What a novel idea.
So the letter was not misplaced and the way government should be run. Taking from Peter and giving to Paul is not the way; helping Peter be more efficient enhances the benefits of why the law was enacted. Otherwise the law is just one more useless law in California designed only to further the tax burden with no benefits to Man or the environment.
They had every right to submit the letter asking for this windfall. They are the ones paying for it. The other manner of characters have no right to capitalize on others misfortune just because the California one party system contrived of liberal activists says so. We are first Americans with rights of property.
From the CARB website:
“The Mission of the California Air Resources Board: To promote and protect public health, welfare and ecological resources through the effective and efficient reduction of air pollutants while recognizing and considering the effects on the economy of the state.”
“The Major Goals of the Board are to: … Base Decisions on Best Possible Scientific and Economic Information; Provide Quality Customer Service to All ARB Clients.”
techgm says:
From the CARB website:
“The Mission of the California Air Resources Board: To promote and protect public health, welfare and ecological resources through the effective and efficient reduction of air pollutants while recognizing and considering the effects on the economy of the state.”
“The Major Goals of the Board are to: … Base Decisions on Best Possible Scientific and Economic Information; Provide Quality Customer Service to All ARB Clients.”
Techgm, I have edited CARB’s mission and goals:
“The Mission of the California Air Resources Board: to promote and protect public employees health, welfare and ecological resources through the effective and efficient reduction of air pollutants while recognizing and considering the effects on the California state budget and the public employees of the state.”
“The Major Goals of the Board are to: Base Decisions on only the bought and paid for Scientific and Economic information that agrees with our theories; Provide Quality Customer Service to all CARB and State employees ensuring long and prosperous careers under Public Service.”
In BC, the carbon tax on nat gas is $30 per ton of CO2 equivalent as of June 1. This about a 35% tax on the commodity price of nat gas. The gov gets away with this tax because nobody takes the time analyze the nat gas bill.
@Author of the Letter …. rather than waste time and resources on what you know is a futile act, why not do something meaningful?
The California Construction Trucking Association and California Dump Truck Owners Association are at the heart of all construction activities in California. Simply withhold service to to any public sector project to start, and then stop ALL service to ALL projects, public and private.
There is more than one way to achieve a result – CARB wants to reduce emissions and/or penalize those who do the work in California. Stop ALL work by your members and publicize the reason why.
All Californian’s benefit from the work of these construction trades. The trades should no be penalized for providing a valued and necessary service. If the State intends to continue to unfairly penalize your groups then stop providing service.
See how quickly the State decides its worth talking when the construction is shut down.
In Minnesota the state government shutdown over budget, cost hundreds of millions on idled construction projects.
Productive, informed people *leaving* is *why* we’re in this mess!
If you run away now, you’ll have to run away from wherever you went, because the idiots are guaranteed to follow you!
wws says:
May 31, 2012 at 5:23 pm
for all of you in California, all I can say is…
Come to Texas!!! Texas is open for business, and we want you!
____________________________________
No you do not want them.
New Hampshire got the Marxist overflow from Massachusetts when the Marxists in MA passed California type laws but did not want to pay for them in taxes. They moved to NH and then complained it was not more like MA – Rolls eyes. So they have been trying to pass California type laws ever since. NC has the same problem.
A little history here – I remember when California was a good old red-neck, blue collar state (which it obviously is not anymore) where a person could leave the keys in the car and not worry about it being stolen, etc. San Francisco, for an example, was a solid working class town with progressive instincts. CA had its drawbacks – racism, misogyny, etc. but that’s improved.
The point here, politically speaking, just shows what happens when a bunch of city slickers from the East, South, and Midwest move out here and change the political landscape.
OK, city slickers, if you want, hammer me. Your turn.
I put this link in another thread, too, so I hope two isn’t thought of as ‘thread bombing’. It’s just appropriate to both.
I recently took a hard look at my utility bill and did a spreadsheet. Any of natural gas, propane (in 20 lb tanks), Diesel, Gasoline and of course ‘yard waste’ are cheaper ways to cook dinner than my nice clean All Electric Kitchen.
IF they layer more taxes on electricity and more on natural gas, all that will happen is that more yard waste will be burned instead of composted… I’m sure that will help the air.
http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2012/05/29/camping-at-home-is-cheaper/
They have no clue about how ’emergent systems’ like economies evolve. ( AKA “The Law Of Unintended Consequences”). So tax things like truckers too much and pretty soon you have no trucks… and no food in the stores.
Roger Cohen,
Thank you for your comment and for many good points and reminders (e.g. “keep your eyes on the pea”). Your point about how the damages of CAGW have been estimated is important. Without much better estimates for this critical input (and others) the basis for CO2 pricing is weak.
Be real careful what you ask for. Think “Austin everywhere”. Displaced libs endeavor to recreate the conditions they fled. It’s a virus.
A. Scott says:
@Author of the Letter …. rather than waste time and resources on what you know is a futile act, why not do something meaningful?
A. Scott, thank you for your advice however it does contain flaws specific to the industries regulated. I agree your idea would be the ultimate slap to the State of California but in reality it just would not work and here is why. The regulated class to start the boycott and the industries required are the small business in California. Large national and international companies would ignore the call and take the business away from their smaller counterparts and no benefits would be achieved.
For example, on the CARB’s diesel rule, the large conglomerates had no problems complying as they simply moved the non-compliant trucks to their other out of state branches and replaced them with compliant trucks. Small local businesses did not have that luxury and went out of business or paid huge dollars to continue to stay in business. Their non-compliant trucks were now worthless to sell.
A. Scott, if there were some way to implement your plan and to make it work like it did in Minnesota, we have yet to find a way. Has a lot of merit however and thanks again for the thought.